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Tuesday, December 8th, 2009
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12:56 pm - When I opened my pantry door the other night......
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| Friday, December 4th, 2009
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12:24 pm - Gee Thanks for the Climate Change Canada!
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| Tuesday, November 24th, 2009
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10:03 am - Miami (Underwater) Art Museum
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Nicolai Ouroussoff's review of Herzog and de Meuron's new Miami Art Museum design
I find Ouroussoff's architectural criticism to be focused on formalistic issues to the detriment of addressing other equally important criteria in architecture, like building technology, contextualism, and "user-friendliness". I wrote him this:
Mr. Ouroussoff, I enjoyed your take on the new Miami museum design, but how could you possibly not address the issue of siting an art museum yards away from the ocean in a world that will see the oceans rise with global warming? Doesn't that seem a little strange to you? And can Americans afford to build disposable museums anymore?
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| Thursday, November 19th, 2009
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11:24 am - Lucky 8
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Our favorite dish of the evening: Thai Style Hot Pot Seafood Soup
Last night I joined 7 friends for the first Gourmet Group outing to my favorite Vietnamese restaurant, Kim Son on Jefferson St, in Old Chinatown. We had mostly Vietnamese dishes - Cha Gio - the little eggrolls wrapped with lettuce and herbs and dipped in clear nuoc nam - fish sauce, grilled shrimp paste around sugar cane "bones", Singapore style omelette with bean sprouts and shrimp, fried squid with sweet spicy sauce, Thai Style Hot Pot soup made with whole Kaffir Lime leaves and drizzles of chili oil on the top, and a homey soup made of Mustard Greens with Pork Ribs. And for entrées we had garlic butter soft shell crab, coconut curry beef, Mekong style seafood with tomato, catfish in a claypot, Treasure duck, and Beef 3 ways, which was grilled scallopinis of beef wrapped around different herbs with different spices that were rolled into rice paper dipped in hot water with pineapple and Thai basil and cilantro and bean sprouts. We also had Lychee martinis, soda lemonade, and Café Su Da (iced espresso with condensed milk) and Choclatinis for dessert. All that and a 20% tip for $40 a person.
The principles of the Mangiafesto were observed - the Imposition of a $1 a minute tarriff for lateness made sure that everyone was actually a bit early. I'm going to add a codicil to the Mangiafesto: The best leftover goes to the person who has the tiniest stomach who most valiantly tried to try a bite of everything. Because the bears at the table can really eat, and it's not fair for ladies or wee people to not get their fair share. Actually the only violation of the Mangiafesto was a couple of minutes of exposition on "Work" which unless it involves being a SuperSpy or a SuperVilain is expressly forbidden as dinner conversation.
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| Sunday, November 15th, 2009
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3:58 pm - Starry Saturday
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The cast of Io sono l'amore (I am love), with Tilda Swinton and Marisa Berenson.
Last night, a friend joined me to a special advance screening of Luca Guadagnino's collaboration with Tilda Swinton at the Cinema Arts Festival. The Festival was organized by local film curators from museums and universities, so all the films shown were similar in their emphasis on formal visual approaches as opposed to storytelling or even character development. After the movie the director and star discussed the movie and influences from Hitchcock and Visconti and Sirk.
I sat a couple of rows behind Tilda Swinton and Guadagnino. She's charismatic, tall, very pale, beautiful but not pretty, and her hair was blond and short. She was wearing a black Lanvin(?) cocktail dress with a boat neck in the front that plunged in a V in the back with an ivory faille bow above the butt. Plain black patent stilettos. She airkissed socialite and longtime couture customer Lynn Wyatt, once close friend of Princess Grace, who was right in front of me.
Swinton asked that journalists not review the movie yet, since it wasn't completely finished. So I won't criticize the film, even though I'm not a journalist. It reminded me in some ways of Pasolini's Teorema, and Visconti's Senso and Ophul's Earrings of Madame de and Antonioni's La Notte, but it also had a 70s European film vibe to it. I recommend it.
One of the amazing features of the movie is that it had a score by John Adams who's probably the most prominent living modern classical composer, and this is the first time he allowed his music to be used in a film. Some of the score was new material but a lot of it was taken from previous works like Nixon in China and The Death of Klinghoffer..
It was wonderful to see Marisa Berenson in a movie again, and it was fascinating to see her portray a descendant of the sort of Milan colloborator fascist culture that her grandmother Elsa Schiaparelli shunned when she left for Paris and then New York back in World War II.
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| Friday, November 13th, 2009
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11:28 am - Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow
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 From the self-portrait challenge thrown down by ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) thornyc yesterday, I took advantage of the low afternoon light coming from my window to take a one arm shot.
Yesterday, to celebrate my friend Jennie's birthday we went to see Mariza, the Portuguese diva of the fado. We sat on the front row, a little to stage right, and got to see her sing about 8 feet away. She gave 6 encores, sang songs in Spanish and Angolan patois and had us all dancing at the end of the show. I highly recommend sitting on the first row for concerts, it was the first time I had done so at Jones Hall, and when at the end of the concert when Mariza came to the front of the stage with two guitar players and sang without amplification, it was so tender and moving. Afterwards we crossed the street and had a post concert snack of excellent fatty unagi sashimi with agadashi tofu and shared a beer.
Today - I just got a call from an old friend who is in town for the weekend for Homecoming at the U, who only last year was battling cancer down to the nitty gritty, and had basically at that time said her goodbyes to her friends. So that's a stunning joy. I wish she had used this newfangled little thing called email to let me know beforehand that she was dropping by, but warriors don't have the same priorities as civilians. I can't wait to see her later.
Tomorrow night, I'm going with a young friend to go see the premiere of Tilda Swinton's new movie at the small theater at the MFA and she's going to be there! With the director to answer questions later. It's a big secret what the movie is, there's a clue that it's set in Italy. She's in town as the major draw for the new Houston Cinema Arts Festival, which focuses on artist made films, not necessarily independents as that term has come to mean, and not exactly experimental either. Tilda is appearing several times to talk about her film Derek about Derek Jarman, and her work in Teknolust, and she's going to introduce the Red Shoes at a big free show at Discovery Green, the downtown park.
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| Wednesday, November 11th, 2009
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12:47 pm - "Back" by Wilfrid Wilson Gibson
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They ask me where I’ve been,
And what I’ve done and seen.
But what can I reply
Who know it wasn’t I,
But someone, just like me,
Who went across the sea
And with my head and hands
Slew men in foreign lands …
Though I must bear the blame
Because he bore my name.
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| Tuesday, November 10th, 2009
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2:10 pm - Nigella's Slutty Moroccan Lamb Stew
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 I adapted Nigella Lawson's recipe:
http://www.nigella.com/recipe/recipe_detail.aspx?rid=249
and made lamb shanks with onions, a can of Cento chef cut tomatoes, carrots, and red lentils last night, with a lot of turmeric, cinnamon, fenugreek, cardomom, and the juice of two little clementines. It was excellent, the lamb falls off the bone, and easy to make, just remember not to put the lentils in until 25 minutes until you sit down to eat.. You could do it in a crockpot after you brown the lamb. It's a good way to add a healthier less expensive cut of red meat to your diet, and the stew has a lot of Vitamin A.
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| Sunday, November 8th, 2009
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5:22 pm - Gourmet Group Mangiafesto
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 I started a monthly gourmet group with my Houston area friends on Facebook.
Eat adventurously
Try new things, new countries, new cultures.
Dine at a dinner hour, lunch at leisure.
Share your dish with others.
Savor, don't bolt.
A bite of this won't kill you, try it.
According to St. Anthony Bourdain, Tuesday through Thursday are the best nights to dine - best for chefs and fresh food (especially fish) and Sundays are the best day to lunch.
Fridays and Saturdays are for dates, romance, and weekends in the countryside.
Wine is a food.
Strive to eat sustainably and seasonally.
Be open about your "finds" - a successful restaurant helps families sustain themselves and prosper, and encourages other restaurants to get better and provide good value.
Eat together like a family and split checks evenly, because separate checks or nickle and diming at the end of a meal is a crashing boor. If you don't drink alcohol or eat a particular animal protein, then order an extra vegetable dish or another dessert to try.
Thou Shalt NOT Flake. If you can't keep your dinner commitment you short everyone else of a round of dishes to sample. The very least you can do is send a replacement or perhaps a call to the restaurant to put a sample of dishes on your tab for the others to try. (I'm not kidding about this.)
Thou Shalt NOT Be Late. On time means 5 minutes early actually. If you're over 15 minutes late you owe everybody a bottle of wine or a couple of appetizers or desserts. (I'm really not kidding about this.)
Thou Shalt NOT talk about work or weather in depth unless you are a Super Spy or Super Vilain, or the weather includes hurricanes or rains of frogs.
Thou Shalt NOT be so high or tipsy that you fail to be charming or attentive. No dozing or fisticuffs at table.
Dinners are scheduled to last 2 hours. Sunday lunch 3 hours. No bolting your food and twiddling your thumbs for the check. Gourmets do not rush.
No icky facial expressions - if you do not appreciate Tail of Jabberwocky keep your distaste politely private.
We expect to be seated with 2/3rd of a party has arrived.
We expect to tip 20% for service in restaurants in the USA or other countries where waiters can not rely on being paid a professional salary, unless the waiting is absolutely egregious.
We expect that the chef would enjoy making something especially creative for us all, if we ask politely.
Couples should ideally be separated at table to provide more interesting conversational gambits, perhaps a bit of intrigue, smouldering looks, and harmless flirtations.
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| Saturday, November 7th, 2009
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5:46 pm - Why I'm Mostly Vegetarian
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| Wednesday, November 4th, 2009
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11:25 am - Creeped Out
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| Monday, November 2nd, 2009
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2:25 pm - Not to be a Debbie Downer or anything..
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 but I saw this on the Joe.My.God. blog today, a very sobering article from New York magazine about exacerbated aging disorders for people with HIV.
http://nymag.com/health/features/61740/
As far as news go, it's not easy to read. It makes me worry for my friends, and I hesitate to tell them about the article because it is pretty tough to read, but every day that they can guard their health better is a day saved, so I'm going to tell them all the same.
I was shocked to read that bone density is so adversely affected in men with HIV, and insulin resistance. And that the recent trend of delaying treatment after seroconversion until a target T-cell limit is reached, has had severely adverse effects over time.
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| Friday, October 30th, 2009
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3:34 pm - Scumbag.....
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 ...used....is what I found tied to the support strut for my truck's door mirror when I left the grocery store. Mildly annoyed, I drove the short distance home wondering who and why and how. As I cut it off with a box cutter, and swabbed down the surfaces with hand sanitizer, I realized that this one incident - more than the sum of all the chickenshit perpetrations ever to happen in my life - more than the total amount of pure evil maliciousness invoked upon any human being by another - yea, even more than the horrid long history of mass murder and genocide among our species - none of these had ever so fully, and completely, and finally eradicated and burned out the last tiny feeble hope of redemption that I had for humanity.
Plenty of other species are violent, prone to rages and killing for pleasure and not sustenance. But only human beings have attained the ability to be utter chickenshits - to hone the talent for pointless and feeble spite to such a fine degree. Other animals can be quite visually and sonically creative, people are not unique in creating art, and recent studies have shown that even language might possibly not be a unique purview of our species either. Our one solitary quality that bears no comparison in the animal world is our capacity to be petty - to engage in making our own characters and motives so infinitesimally small - that the tiniest spinning charmed string of quantum energy has more purpose and right to exist.
Please do not think that an offense to my enormous ego or my accumulated hubris has been enough to rob me of my faith for humanity. Nay, the slings and arrows of outrageous misfortune are not what troubles me. There have been 17 arsons within 6 blocks of my house over the last few months, with no hope from the police or fire department at catching the perpetrator(s). Neither those events, nor the recent cruel and much too early illnesses and deaths of friends due to an incompetent American healthcare system have destroyed my confidence in the improvability of mankind. Nope, what has done that is the random, quck, indifferent, and petty action of a typical person.
If an asteroid is ever scheduled to collide with Earth, I will aid you my friend to trek to the waiting space ark. I shall provide you roasted almonds and perhaps some guava paste or other healthily caloric provision, and along with a warm hat and a fresh final cigar in a tube, you may also have a flask of excellent whiskey. But don't ask me to drive you there. Not even your darling children or grandkids. Because I have no hope for the human species any more. I believe that the experiment has run it's course and the data are conclusive, people are basically less noble than our companion animals and livestock.
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| Monday, October 26th, 2009
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8:37 pm - Bob Maddox
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I learned tonight that Bob Maddox has died. That's him on the far left in a picture taken 10 years ago. My best bud Bubbles, third from the left in the glasses, told me. Bob was the proprietor of Male Hide Leathers in Chicago for many years, until he retired to live closer to his family in Ohio. He had provided to be buried next to his great love Frank in Kentucky, but there will be a memorial service in Chicago.
I really liked Bob, he was jovial, and friendly, and nasty in the best way. He was a real man's man, but was so much fun to hang out with. He'd get tickled and laugh so hard, that you could see the mischievous liitle boy in him. I met him back in 1990 when he came down to Houston to visit Bubbles. I last saw him back in 2001, when a bunch of my friends flew up to Chicago for a Sludgemaster Mud Party at the Cellblock. Since then I'd sent him Christmas cards, but I didn't get one back last year. He was a real mensch that Bob.
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| Friday, October 23rd, 2009
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11:54 am - Off with her Head. Or her Speakership at least.
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Today I read that Nancy Pelosi is poor mouthing the chances to pass a robust public option in the Healthcare negotiations, which is a defeatist posture, when the woman ought to be steadfast and inexorable.
I admire Pelosi''s stands on political issues but she can't deliver when it counts, this Healthcare issue needs a leader that can wheel and deal and drag by the short hairs and bust some heads, and Pelosi can't do that. When she was so ineffectual at halting funding of Bush's Iraq debacle back in 2006, Democrats should have understood that a Speaker without any teeth in her mouth isn't much of a guard dog for the country.
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| Wednesday, October 21st, 2009
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2:49 pm - Boudin Kolaches
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| Tuesday, October 20th, 2009
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3:38 pm - Shit from Shinola
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| Thursday, October 15th, 2009
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1:12 pm - My friend's coming home from Boston for 4 days of Mexican food and parties...
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| Wednesday, October 14th, 2009
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3:30 pm - Holy Mackerel Batman!
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 If you eat sushi, or just like regular seafood, then have a look at the Monterey Bay Aquarium's Seafood Sustainability Website. There's a lot of good information there about what sorts of seafood are plentiful and healthy to harvest and eat, and what sorts of fish and shellfish that should be avoided.
Generally smaller fish are better, and it's a good thing I like mackerel, although it's a real disappointment to see that Unagi (freshwater eel) are on the avoid list. I'm going to take the list to my favorite sushi place Osaka and ask them where their fish come from. The fishmonger I use labels all of their catch, but I was surprised to see that squid was on the Good list, and not the Best choice list.
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| Sunday, October 11th, 2009
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5:05 pm - The Least of the Least Among Us
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I'm watching the last golden hours of the National Equality March, and as the progression of speakers rolls on, the constituencies of each speaker falls away in numbers as the crowds diminish, showing that the least among us suffer the most discrimination. These are the people who can't pass, who didn't grow up in suburbs with good schools, who didn't have supportive families or scholarships to college, who never even had the illusion of equality attend them for a year or a day. These people are the strong ones among us, the ones that don't tire, the stubborn, the focused - the greatest.
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Today in Houston. WTF?
Here's a picture from the Fantasy Ball held two weeks ago.
What can you expect of a state that's still ruled over by Cthulu and the Great Old Ones?
The Houston Press food blog has an article today about 